Azerbaijan, Baku, Nov. 30 / Trend /
Greek and Azerbaijani deputy foreign ministers Spyros Kouvelis and Mahmud Mammadguliyev discussed the special importance of cooperation between Greece and Azerbaijan in the energy sector during their meeting this week in Thessaloniki, the Greek Foreign Ministry reported.
"Special attention was paid to the construction project of the ITGI gas pipeline," the ministry said. "Further strengthening Greek-Azerbaijani business relations in construction, building materials, introducing new technologies and other areas were also discussed."
Kouvelis's upcoming visit to Baku to take part in a meeting of an inter-ministerial committee was discussed, as well as the preparations for Greek President Karolos Papoulias' official visit to Azerbaijan in April next year.
The ITGI transport corridor will transport Azerbaijani gas to Greece and Italy and includes updated Turkish pipeline infrastructure and also ITG projects such as the Turkey-Greece junction pipeline and IGI. The Greece-Italy junction pipeline is a missing link of the Turkey-Greece-Italy transport corridor, which enables gas transports from the Caspian region and Middle East to Italy and Western Europe via Turkey and Greece. The ITGI's designed carrying capacity is 12 billion cubic meters per year.
The ITGI pipeline will stretch from Azerbaijan across Georgia via the existing Baku-Tbilisi-Erzerum Pipeline to Turkey, Greece and Italy.
The Italian company Edison is responsible for the construction of the pipeline plot between Greece and Italy on the bottom of the Adriatic Sea, which will be completed by 2012.
Greece will receive 3.6 billion cubic meters of the pipeline's planned capacity worth 11.8 billion cubic meters per year. Italy will receive the remaining amount.